The first will be a charter amendment that if approved by voters would allow the 49ers to use their own contractor rather than having to go through the RFP process. The second vote will be on whether they want the stadium at all. The two questions would appear on the same ballot.

As for when the vote will take place, a report provided the council suggests that it would be least expensive ($152,000) to put the issue before voters at the same time as the statewide elections on June 8, 2010, while the most expensive option ($652,000) would be a special election on April 13, 2010. The cost of an all-mail election on March 2, 2010 would be $364,000, according to the report.

The stadium would be built adjacent to the city's convention center, the Great America theme park and the football team's existing headquarters and training facility. The city council signed off on the financing deal for the stadium in June . The $937-million plan includes up to $114 million in public subsidy, 62% of it from the city.

The agreement calls for the city to pay for up to $72 million and for eight nearby hotels to put up an additional $35 million by way of a voluntary room tax. The team agreed to pay for any construction cost overruns as well as any operational shortfall. In exchange, the team will keep all revenue from ticket sales from games, ad revenue from NFL events, ticket premium fees for suite and club room use for non-NFL events, and revenue from the team store.

The newly formed Santa Clara Stadium Authority would get revenue from naming rights; net revenue from concession sales and parking lots; and annual rent payments from the team that would total roughly $40 million over the life of the contract, which has an initial lease term of 40 years that may be extended by an additional 20 years.

The city's $72 million includes up to $42 million in tax-increment financing from the city's redevelopment agency, $20 million to relocate a power substation and $17 million to help build a $42-million 1,700-space parking garage that would service not only the stadium but also the convention center and the theme park.

If the redevelopment agency doesn't have the necessary funds to foot the $40 million for the stadium and the hotel tax doesn't generate the additional $35 million the 49ers would be responsible for making up the difference. If the economy does not improve and the funds do not eventually become available, the 49ers would simply not be repaid, assistant city manager Ron Garratt told GlobeSt.com.

The stadium is slated to rise on a 13.5-acre, 2,300-slip auxiliary parking lot for the theme park, which is owned by Cedar Fair Entertainment Co. The proposed structured parking would replace about one-third of those spaces while the remainder of the space would be made up in part by reconfiguring the park's main parking lot.

The next step in the process is to complete the environmental impact report, circulate it for public comment and then bring it before the planning commission and then the city council for approval, most likely this fall, Garratt said. After that, the term sheet will be used to create the ballot language for the citywide election.

If voters reject the plan the 49ers attention likely will shift back to San Francisco where the city, in partnership with Lennar, wants a new 49ers stadium at Hunter's Point to replace Candlestick Park. Either way, the goal is to have the stadium ready for the 2014 NFL season. The team's initial lease term at Candlestick runs through this season but the team holds three five-year extension options such that it could continue to play in its existing stadium through 20